Dee and Lao, John and Me: An Origin Story — Guest Post by SJ Rozan

This is a wonderful account of all the serendipitous moments behind-the-scenes as SJ Rozan & John Shen Yen Nee brought The Murder of Mr. Ma to life — they went from total strangers to writing collaborators, they went through mountains of reading & research, and they found the right people at just the right time to get over a hurdle. The Murder of Mr. Ma launches today.

***

S. J. Rozan: 

Mid-2020, a couple of months into the pandemic, I get a phone call from my agent, Josh Getzler. He's working from home, I'm working from home, everyone's working from home. The isolation is beginning to grate, even on writers, who, like moles, spend much of our lives alone. Josh has just spoken to a guy, he informs me, a friend of Alex Segura's, another of Josh's clients and The Man Who Is Everywhere. The guy's name is John Nee, Josh was on the phone with him for an hour and a half, and he came to two tentative conclusions about him: One, he might be crazy; and Two, even if one is true, he might have a project that's perfect for me. Would I talk to this John Nee?

Now, at this point in the pandemic, I'm talking to the cat, I'm talking to the walls. Someone I don't l know, with a project I know nothing about? Of course I'll talk to him. So John calls me. We talk for an hour and a half, and I come to a definite conclusion: Josh is right on both counts.

Count Two, the project, is so intriguing that I don't care about Count One. John has imagined a multi-book series starring Judge Dee Ren Jie, a Chinese jurist from the Tang Dynasty. Not that he wants to write about the Tang Dynasty, which ran from roughly 600-900 AD. In the grand tradition of historical fiction, he wants to bring Judge Dee into the 20^th century. Specifically, to start, London, 1924, and then after awhile, through the years. Well, why not? And he wants to hook him up with another real-life historical figure, the Chinese writer Lao She, who came to London in the twenties to teach. Lao will become Dee's Watson, the series narrator, while Dee charges around London, investigating murders and doing a lot of kung fu. Dee, in the stories about him (some Chinese oral history, some written by Robert Van Gulik in the 1940's, published in the 1950's), had a team, a supporting cast. They'd gradually be assembled and everyone would go forth solving mysteries and kung fu fighting.

What John needs is a novelist. His mind's like a Roman candle factory, spinning off ideas right and left. As an exec at both DC and Marvel he's used to handing off projects to writers and artists. He doesn't spend hours in a solitary mole hole choosing one word to put after another. I, of course, do. I love to. So John sends me his outline for Book One. It's sixteen single spaced pages and contains not only the kitchen sink but all the sinks from all the buildings on the block. Some, er, ah, pruning is needed.

There's another issue, too. While I know Judge Dee and have read his stories, I've heard of Lao She but not read him. The engine of this book is the Chinese Labour Corps in France during World War One. The what? I'm way behind. Don't worry, says John, I'll send some books.

This I take to mean, books from his home library that will get me up to speed. It does. It also means books from Bookshop.org, BetterWorldBooks.com, and that other behemoth online bookseller. Every time I turn around books are dropping into my mailbox. About the Chinese Labour Corps, about Chinese modern history, about Lao She, by Lao She. So I sit and I read and I read.

A second problem is, London, 1924 is also not my expertise. Who you gonna call? Laurie King, of course. Another box of books, old maps, old guidebooks shows up on my doorstep. I read some more.

Finally I'm ready to write a sample chapter. This is a fraught moment. If John doesn't like the voice, game over. It's how Lao She has spoken in my head, after all I've read by and about him. You writers out there will recognize this: once the voice has arrived, there's no changing it.

I chew my nails.

John loves it!

And we're in business.

One more snag, though. In the mists of the ancient past I studied tae kwon do. Thus Lydia Chin's skill in that form. In 1924, though, tae kwon do hadn't been invented, and if it had been, no Chinese jurist would have been practicing it. Kung fu is one more thing I know nothing about. That's okay, John says, we'll get a consultant.

Not so easy. Kung fu choreographers abound, but they work largely in the movies, where they get a bunch of actors together, choregraph on them, and charge $10,000 a scene. Nice for the movies. This is publishing. Not happening. So the fight scenes are languishing behind the rest of the book, which I'm writing and every couple of chapters sending to John for review. And here we have an example of what people mean when they say, If you put it out into the universe you'll get your answer. I never really believed that. But I'm at a birthday party and a friend asks how the new project's going. I tell him great, except we have a real problem because we can't find a kung fu consultant. The guy behind me, another friend, Henry, taps me on the shoulder. He apologizes for eavesdropping but says he studied kung fu for awhile with a guy down in Chinatown, Sifu (Master) Paul Koh. Probably, says Henry, this is a gig Sifu Koh would love.

So I call Sifu Koh. I send him the outline, I go meet with him and his assistant, Kristen Rosenfeld, at the Bo Law Kung Fu School. And he's fabulous.

Now we're really in business. The result of the business is THE MURDER OF MR. MA. And this is a business I hope to be in for a long, long time.

VETERANS DAY MYSTERIES // VETERANS DAY CRIME FICTION

Veterans Day, originally known as Armistice Day (also known as Remembrance Day), is November 11. Veterans Day commemorates the armistice signed between the Allies of World War I and Germany at Compiègne, France, for the cessation of hostilities on the Western Front, that took effect at eleven o'clock in the morning — the "eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month" 1918.

U.S. President Woodrow Wilson first proclaimed Armistice Day November 11, 1919. The U.S.  Congress passed a concurrent resolution seven years later on June 4, 1926, requesting the President issue another proclamation to observe November 11 with appropriate ceremonies. The 11th of November is"a day to be dedicated to the cause of world peace and to be thereafter celebrated and known as 'Armistice Day'." It was later changed to Veteran's Day.

I love to read mysteries that reflect regions and holidays, so I'm reposting about Veterans Day with several additions. Julia Spencer-Fleming's Once Was a Soldier,  Jacqueline Winspear, Renie Airth, and Charles Todd's mystery series are at the top of my list of Veterans Day Mysteries. There's also the Joe Sandilands series by Barbara Cleverly. And Bulldog Drummond is a WWI veteran in the Sapper/H.C. McNeile books. Add to that Walter Mosley's WWII Vet Easy Rawlins. Don't miss Marcia Talley's All Things Undying in which Hannah Ives helps to locate the grave of a WWII serviceman. James Lee Burke is another great mystery author whose Cajun detective Dave Robicheaux is a Vietnam Veteran. And, of course, the Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club by Dorothy L. Sayers where the mystery turns on the poppy in the lapel.

Mysteries in Paradise about Remembrance DayBV Lawson's 2007 post of Veteran's Day Mysteries is great. No need to duplicate her efforts. Be sure and read her blog, as well as all the comments. Another fine list is In Remembrance Fiction in Times of War (not all mysteries) from the St. Charles Public Library. I also did a Memorial Day post here on Mystery Fanfare that covers some of the same territory.  is also a great resource.

You'll want to read J. Kingston's Pierce's article 9 Mysteries Set in the Immediate Aftermath of WWI on CrimeReads.

Wikipedia has an entry about Veterans Day Mysteries. Several hardboiled heroes have been war veterans. Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer and many others from World War II, and John D. MacDonald's Travis McGee from the Korean War. "The frequent exposure to death and hardship often leads to a cynical and callous attitude as well as a character trait known today as post-traumatic stress characterizes many hardboiled protagonists."

And a few more Vietnam War Veterans Mysteries:  

Dog Soldiers by Robert Stone

Quarry by Max Allan Collins

Dragonfish by Vu Tran

The Given World by Marian Palaia

The Sympathizer by Viet Than Nguyen

First Blood by David Morrell

Dog Day Afternoon by Vern E. Smith

The Man Who Won the Medal of Honor by Len Giovannitti

Going After Cacciato by Tim O'Brien

Operation Burning Candle by Blyden Jackson

The Odd Angry Shot by William Nagle. 

Iraq War Veteran

The Drifter by Nick Petrie (and others in the Peter Ash series)
Young Blood by Matt Gallagher

The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers

For the young set, one of the first Veteran-related mysteries: Cherry Ames: Veterans' Nurse by Helen Wells. 

As always, let me know any Veterans Crime Fiction that you recommend.

Read a Veterans Day mystery today and remember the men and women who have served our country. Thank you for your service.

In Memory of Veteran - Major Joseph Rudolph, M.D., WWII

Charles Todd: Writing About War

I decided to post some of the author essays from the recent Mystery Readers Journal: Murder in Wartime issue. This author essay is by Charles Todd. Charles Todd is the mother-son writing team of Charles and Caroline Todd. Together they write the bestselling Inspector Ian Rutledge mysteries, the Bess Crawford mysteries. They have also written two stand-alone novels. 

The latest issue of Mystery Readers Journal (33:2) focuses on Murder in Wartime is available in hardcopy or as a downloadable PDF.

Charles Todd: 
Writing About War

You don’t study the past in any depth without coming to the conclusion that war is one of the main threads running through human history. Look at Egyptian monuments, where stone armies race across the front of great gates, and enemies are trampled beneath the Pharaoh’s chariot wheels. Warriors have always gotten great press. Hannibal. King Arthur. Attila the Hun. Genghiz Khan. Spend any time in Peru or Mexico, and you can’t miss the story of Spanish conquests. The Bayeux Tapestry is a colorful account of the Battle of Hastings—from the view point of William the Conqueror. Or look at the American West, where battles between cavalry and Indians made great film material.

And murder isn’t very far behind. Cain and Abel. The story of Horus in Egyptian mythology. Even King David sent his rival into the forefront of battle, so that he could have Bathsheba.

When we were casting about for a war to write about, we naturally looked at our favorite periods. Charles knows the American Civil War inside out. I’d specialized in European and Asian History. We had both learned a great deal about World War II because our parents and grandparents had talked about it.

The problem was, many great mysteries have been set in WWII. Spies were all the rage too. We were both reading Alastair Maclean, John Le Carre, Frederick Forsyth, Jack Higgins. Then there was World War I. Often in the Golden Age of Mystery, it had been a recurrent theme because readers at that time had just experienced the war. It would have seemed odd not to mention it. And so we had Lord Peter Wimsey and his butler/batman Bunter and Captain Hastings, while Poirot was a Belgian refugee.

But no one had been writing about The Great War recently—this was 1994—and the centennial was still ten years away. It also offered us something that we liked. Forensics was in its infancy. To solve a case, a detective still had to rely on his wits, his experience, and his knowledge of people. That appealed to both of us. In their dramas, the Greeks had always felt that a strong protagonist must face an equally strong villain, or the struggle was uneven. Sherlock Holmes had also demonstrated that. The excitement in a good mystery lay in the chase, in the game of wits. And this meant that the writing would prove to be more of a challenge, more intriguing to work out.

Now we had our war, and a detective who must rely on his wits in the grand tradition of mystery. But where did this new detective of ours live? If we were to set our first Great War mystery in the US, we’d have very little war to play with as a backdrop. The US didn’t declare war on Germany until April 1917. And the number of US casualties could be absorbed by the larger, more widespread population here. One might know a veteran of that war, but he didn’t stand begging on every street corner. Hmmm. If we chose England as our backdrop, there were all kinds of intriguing possibilities. After all, the British and the Commonwealth fought for four long bloody years, and they lost a generation of young men.

Still, this presented a few problems. We were American. In addition to learning all about the period, we’d have to see it mostly through British eyes. The war as well. Were we up to that?

The answer was that two naïve people starting out with great enthusiasm thought we just might be able to bring it off. But it added a whole new dimension to our research.

Next question. Should Rutledge work at the Yard during the war? After all, crime didn’t stop just because the world had gone mad and everyone had enlisted. But wouldn’t it seem odd that a perfectly healthy young man didn’t fight? On the other hand, if he was serving, he couldn’t very well solve murders at home too. After the war, though, hindsight was available. And if he’d come home from four bloody years, Rutledge would know all about that, would know how the war had ended, and he would be drawn into the terrible aftermath of the trenches too. (We quickly learned, researching the period, how much of the war we couldn’t put into a book—how much was too horrible to describe.) Another plus? There were still trenches we could walk in, and even today bits of the fighting were being turned up in plowed fields and new roadways.

The biggest dilemma we faced—well, the one we recognized at the start of the book—was how we could demonstrate to the reader what men like Rutledge went through in the trenches, and how this had taken a toll of their families. First of all, if Rutledge had seen the kind of fighting that took place on the Somme, it was likely that he’d been severely wounded. And if he was, he couldn’t return to his position at the Yard. But if he came home without some evidence of what he’d gone through, if the war hadn’t touched him, how could he possibly relate to the men who had? That’s when shellshock and Hamish MacLeod entered the picture—and that complicated our lives even more. Just how do you handle PTSD without making it sound like a gimmick you planned to ditch in a book or two? It was a life and death matter for too many soldiers, and we had to address it as such.

It took us two years to write the first Rutledge. Fortunately we both knew a little about England to start with—but far from enough. That meant going back numerous times to get it right. Still, we persevered. How would they say that in Britain—what would a woman wear in the rain—what food shortages were there--how do you shift a 1914 motorcar—the list went on. The language, the times, the war, characters, the setting, the plot had to be carefully researched. But in the end, we had something we hoped might pass muster. We hadn’t even thought as far as a series. Then, while we were waiting to see if anyone at St. Martin’s wanted to read A TEST OF WILLS, the ideas started fizzing around in our heads, leading to WINGS OF FIRE. Rutledge was here to stay—we hadn’t said all there was to say about this man.

From the start, we’d toyed with looking at the women’s role in the war, but we had our hands full with Rutledge. It wasn’t until about ten books into the series that we felt confident enough in our research and our plot ideas for Rutledge that we could even talk about a book featuring Bess Crawford. Once we got to know her and the world she lived in, we were hooked. They were so different, Bess and Rutledge. And plots that weren’t suitable for one of them often worked a treat with the other.

An unexpected bonus was the fact that we could use some rather sophisticated plot ideas in both series. War creates upheaval in a society that wasn’t used to change on such a large scale. People who hadn’t traveled ten miles from the place where they were born were suddenly thrust into situations they had no experience of. Men who had never owned a weapon were taught to kill. The women waiting at home faced unexpected challenges. Villages that hadn’t seen a murder in a decade suddenly had to deal with a killer in their midst. And that allowed us to explore why normal people might turn to murder as a solution to their problems. It was, in a sense, the personal version of war. A breakdown in human relations where war is a breakdown in relations between nations. No drug kingpins or street gangs or terrorists for us—too predictable! Instead, it was far more frightening to delve into people and their secrets, the pressures and fears and love or hate that turn them to murder. And the settings, those fascinating, seemingly bucolic villages, feel the pull of the past even in the present.

The most important discovery in many ways was that pressing need to go to England—you learn more and faster on the ground, looking for pitfalls and potential. We needed to visit the military museums, to travel to France where the war was fought. You can make up a good many things if you’re an accomplished writer, but a reader somewhere is sure to find you out. Our personal libraries overflowed, looking for first -hand accounts of the war. Bookcases mushroomed in whatever odd space they could be squeezed into. Ceilings groaned. We’ve brought suitcases full of books back from England.

We introduced a third character a few years back. Lady Elspeth, who was in Paris when the Germans crossed the frontier and marched south toward the city. Then she got caught up in a battle as she struggled to get back to England, and had two very good reasons for wanting to fight back. That was more a Christmas tale, heavy on the love story, with only a little crime in it. But it had something to say about people in a time of war, and how personal loss could change the direction of their lives. She wasn’t intended to be a series, but we’d like to write about her again, this time in a more involving mystery.

All in all, war has done well by us. We hope we’ve done well by it. There are still a lot of stories to tell about it. War is a powerful backdrop for murder. And it has changed us as well. We hadn’t expected that.

This is a look at how two writers chose and used war in their mysteries, and some of the decisions we had to make along the way. It’s not the only method, of course, but it’s one that has worked for more than a few books